2024

Hello,

This is our final greeting of 2024.

It has been a calm yet productive year for Mapnitude. Even though we did not launch any new apps, all of our existing apps have performed reliably without significant downtime.

Thanks to iOS 18, which provide the best smooth transition, we have not experienced major issues so far. 

Despite increasing server costs, we are committed to maintaining our services without any limitations for the foreseeable future.

For the Android apps, although changes are not visible, we rolled out significant internal updates which greatly improve stability and security of the apps. 

Last but not least, we would like to thank everyone who reported issues via our website and email so that we could address hundreds of bugs and optimize many small features. 

Your feedback helps us improve continuously. 

Wishing you all a Happy New Year 2025 in advance!

Hello iOS 18, Hello iPhone 16

It’s that time of year again—September, which means a new iPhone release!

I’ve just upgraded my old phone to the iPhone 16 Pro, and I’m excited to put it to the test. I’ll be making sure everything works smoothly with iOS 18 and future updates.

That’s all for now—thanks for reading!

Update 5 Oct 2024

All apps are iOS 18 ready.

Q4 2023

This quarter was full of actions.

New iOS has just been released. It’s a tradition that every major iOS version update will have an issue with the existing app. Luckily this one was one of the smoothest OS updates ever.

Here is what happened so far:

• DistanceCalculator and GeoLoger are now available for subscription. And we saw one of you purchased the sub! Thank you so much! We are really grateful and can not thank you enough!

• We made visual updates for some apps. It’s very subtle, but we think it’s awesome to have!

And a bad news

• BlastSim for iOS was initially our side project we wrote while I was learning iOS app development, and taught us a lot. It went viral so many times, in online media and recently on TikTok.

• We are unable to push a further update because of an issue with the app reviewing process. We had a similar issue way back in 2017 with BlastMap. So we built BlastSim to give more focus on the information aspect. We are not surprised to see that BlastSim will eventually suffer a similar fate.

• We’ve done several submissions to hopefully make it comply with the guidelines, but it still has not passed a review. And after three months, we have given a deadline that the app will be removed from the app store forever.

• It is sad for us to have to wind down the app after seven long years.

• Starting mid-December, the app will no longer be available for download. So while the app is available, one for free if you can!

• For those who already have the app on their device, The app should run smoothly on iOS 17 without a problem without any app updates. However, we have no guarantee that future updates will continue to be working.

• The Android version will live on, so we suggest everyone who wishes to use the app in the future download the Android version instead. Or use a web-app version from other developers which we think they have done better than us.

• We might work on a completely new app. We are always thinking about building a multi-tool map that does everything.

Coordinates Android update

Edit Oct 2, 2023: We made a lot more updates. Please end at the end of this blog post

Follow-up to the previous post, here’s what we have done so far in the past two days.

• Health checkup to make sure there’s no crash during usage. We identify crashes from What3words API issue.

• Some coordinates are not working properly. Eg. MGRS, QTH.

• All of these issues have been fixed

And we introducing a new feature borrowed from Coordaintes 8.0 for iOS

• Big Compass with heading value
  

• Speedometer with direction bearing.

We are looking to add more features soon, but we will be awaiting more feedback through the Contact Us page before we proceed.

---

Oct 2, 2023

Look like we didn’t want to wait and simply continue working on the app!

• We are delighted to tell you that the app is now fully translated into every language without any missing translations.

• And it’s now possible to import a photo and get its coordinates value just like one in the iOS version
  

Coordinates 8.0

We are delighted to introduce a significant update for the Coordinates app on iOS - Version 8.0, featuring these exciting new highlights:

Quick Action Menu

As our apps become more feature-rich, maintaining the app's simplicity has become increasingly challenging. Fortunately, we've devised a solution. Instead of requiring users to navigate deep into the app to execute common tasks, we have streamlined the organization of these tasks, making them easily accessible and user-friendly.

To access the menu, please press this icon.

This approach enables us to keep expanding our feature set, including those that may not be frequently used, such as the Transform Coordinates menu, all while preventing clutter on the main screen, especially on smaller devices.

Furthermore, some features are better suited as external applications, and we have thoughtfully included links to these apps as well!

Speedometer

Inside our app, we've incorporated a speedometer feature that provides real-time information on speed, course direction, and their corresponding accuracy levels.

Upgraded compass

We have enhanced the compass by adding more information, including the heading to the north and the selected pin. You can now customize the visibility of the compass through options in the settings menu.

This wraps up version 8.0, but more exciting features are on the horizon. Please don't hesitate to suggest ideas via the contact form.

What about the Android version?

We have always been aware of Android lagging behind in terms of development. Our goal is to bring it on par with the iOS version someday.

However, we have noticed that we receive fewer messages through our form regarding the Android version. While we receive numerous messages from iOS users, it helps us prioritize our efforts. So, if you wish to see more features and updates for Android, please send us a message to let us know you're out there!

Since we introduced numerous updates for iOS in September, we will temporarily shift our focus away from the iOS version. Starting this October, we will finally be able to dedicate more attention to the Android version.

Our primary focus will be resolving the persistent crash issues in the Android version. Afterward, we will gradually introduce the same features from iOS to the Android version.

Thank you for reading, and we wish you a pleasant Q4.

iOS 17

Hello,

iOS 17 is finally here. And all of our apps went through the update smoothly without issue. We just recently released a minor update for every single app just for it too.

With Q3 coming to an end, we need more time to work on the promised feature. We read many of the emails sent to our mailbox, We do notice some confusion on each app's capabilities. We will soon. release a better short explanation for every app on our website soon. So for Q4, our big plan is to do a website upgrade.

Also, we decided to not continue working on the Apple Watch yet as we don’t see much demand for it.

Thanks for reading and have a nice day!

Quarterly Update: Q2 2023

Hello again,

Despite not having many updates, we finished most of what we promised in the Q1 update.

• We finished re-writing Elevation instructions for iOS in PDF format.

• Slope feature for Elevation iOS app

What we will do next for Q3 2023

• Due to many requests, we will implement a paid feature to DistanceCalculator and Geologger app.

• Hopefully, we will be able to rework on Apple Watch version of all apps.

Unfortunately, we decided to shut down our AIPainter app due to operating costs.

Please email us for feature requests and suggestions so that we can do it asap.

Quarterly Update: Q1 2023

Hello, it's been a while since our last update. We have noticed the emerging technology of AI, especially ChatGPT, which we believe is a huge disruption to every sector. However, at the same time, there are a lot of opportunities possible from it. We will find a way to use this technology to improve our product pipeline in the future.

We have also created our first app with its first prototype design by ChatGPT called AIPainter.

Here is what we plan to do next within Q2:

• We will focus our efforts on the Elevation app and add more features to its app.

• We will complete the documentation rewrite for the Elevation app.

• We plan to launch another AI-inspired app.

For our 2023 roadmap, we are hoping to launch a desktop version of certain apps. However, we will need to seriously think about its revenue model first to make it sustainable for us and provide the best experience for our users.

Thank you for reading.

Introducing our new app: AI Painter

Hello everyone,

I would like to share a story.

With the help of AI, I finally managed to write a new experimental app from scratch plus ten languages within two weeks.

Download link: https://linktr.ee/aipainter

Intro:

I had an idea of doing apps with AI but I have no idea how to start. Luckily, last year there was a tool called Stable Diffusion that utilized computing power from graphic cards to construct images generated by an AI.

This is ideal because our company has quite a size of GPU mining equipment laying around untouched due to a crash in cryptocurrency prices.

So here is the plan for the simple app:

Make a frontend app to connect to the Stable Diffusion server and make it easy to use as possible.

Let’s get started

1. Write a working app

For this task, I use ChatGPT to construct a basic working code for my app. Unsurprisingly, it’s not working out of the box. But the most important thing I got from here is I finally managed to have some idea of how to start building the app.

It took less than a day for my first working prototype, which really encourage me to keep working on the app. It still takes another week for polishing though.

2. Create app icons

I used Stable Diffusion to suggest app icons. These are a few of them. I chose the first one and cropped it a little to make it stands out more

3. Working on UI

Unfortunately, AI didn’t have much help here so I still have to do it manually.

4. Building a server

I’m using my existing mining rig which runs on multiple RTX3080s, I had to upgrade RAM and CPU to make it respond faster. Still, I think it might probably be much more economical than renting GPU-enabled VPS.

5. Writing legal texts

This is where AI shines a lot. No explanation needed

6. Write store description

Instead of taking me hours of writing, now took me seconds.

7. Screenshot

Unfortunately, this is manual labor since I’m using Photoshop to design all screenshots for all ten languages.

8. Localization

Since I’m using Google Translate, so no AI works here.

If you want to try the app, here is the link.

https://linktr.ee/aipainter

Summary

Here is a list of tasks I wrote previously. Parts that AI was involved in are highlighted in bold.

1. Write a working app - 50% Prototype only

2. Create app icon - 100%

3. Working on UI

4. Building a server

5. Write legal texts - 100%

6. Write store descriptions - 100%

7. Screenshots

8. Localization

I think AI saved me more than a week of work.

Here is what I think how AI is useful for app production

• Speed up development time, don’t need for extra labor for the repetitive task.

• Anything to do with human language writing

• Best for searching code snippets or writing basic functions. 80% of the time could replace a few search results on Google or stack overflow.

2023 is the year of AI, we need to adapt to prepare for any disruption.

Long overdue PDF documentation for Coordinates iOS app is now available for download

Happy New Year 2023!

I hope you all have had a great new year so far.

I’m here today to share some good news. Coordinates iOS app finally has PDF documentation which included all updates I posted in many blog posts, now all in one place.

The First version has 107 pages in total.

You can find the download link here - Coordinates Instruction

PDF Documentation for Android version will come later this month.

Have a great day!